What is the appropriate time that freshmen are allowed to start being in committed relationships without being judged?

Written on a ripped up napkin in the drawer of a Montreal vegan cafe table:

8 October 22

One month in Montréal and it’s finally starting to feel like home. Loneliness is part of the journey. So is joy and love and peace and wonder at every turn. People are good and kind, and showing love and care is never something you’ll regret.

“Ask a good question before school today, Nomi.” I hold reverberations of girlhood in my hand–I must grasp onto my father’s words. It’s all about wonder, isn’t it? It’s all about the questioning. Wonder deeply about the people and the care is apparent. At least I hope the care is apparent. I think my dad would say that my wonderings are care. People are good and kind. People are good and they are kind and they are just like me and just the opposite. 

How do I hold two truths in my hands? How do I hold terror and horror and tragedy in my heart? I anticipated this conflict coming into university, but I didn’t understand the physicality of the conflict in my body to not say anything, to not know what to say, to be so disheartened. The ache in my stomach to find the words that I cannot find, that I want the courage to voice. I struggle and I grieve and I hold my six-pointed star necklace in my hand.

Why are the La Colombe canned lattes not offered as part of late meal? That would profoundly better me.

On a zoom call last year, a speaker said, “If nothing matters, then the reason we are here is to walk each other home.” Are we all walking each other home? I am surrounded by one thousand of the most brilliant minds in my year, all of whom have left home, all of whom fleeing their normal of overworking and undersleeping, and all of whom have been waiting and waiting and waiting, ready to leave and experience something more enriching, create something greater. So maybe, experiencing this place together, is, inherently, walking eachother home. Maybe the world is too big, the time is too fleeting, the grief is too imminent, nothing matters, and we are all just walking each other home. Every 12:42am walk back to the dorms with people I met two months ago who feel like magic – all just walking eachother home. 

This campus is marvelous. These trees, these leaves, these buildings, these paths. How lucky am I?

I saw Angela Davis speak. I saw Angela Davis speak. She implored us to “think large” about the world, about all who will come after. That “this is just a minute in time, especially when you think about the temporality of the universe.” Nothing matters yet everything matters. This is the beginning of my life, but life is just a minute. I need to think largely and I need to think minutely. How do I hold the need to think about my wider purpose–about the vastness of space and peoplehood and oppression and my role? I am reminded of Annie Dillard’s words, “How we spend our days is how we spend our lives.” Hour by hour. Day by day. That is thinking large.  

How do I make my tangible and lasting impact in this rich, complicated place? I can make a tangible impact in this rich, complicated place. How lucky am I?

Nations last an average of 250 years before destruction, revolution, or mass change. 250 years, or just a minute in time. Is this the beginning of an end? I ache. I ache. 

I miss my childhood friends. I miss my sisters. I will probably never spend weeks on end with any of them again. 

I was walking to my dorm today, and I began to feel like it was a walk I’ve done a million times at camp, my home during the summers of my life. The overlapping trails of campus and camp’s property perfectly line up. Is my body wishing it were elsewhere? Or am I now home? Or am I constantly existing across all the trails I have ever considered home?

1/7/2024 11:07pm (in my notes app): 

I’m doing it again. Trying to absorb all the words I can. I am so overwhelmed, so excited.

I am still so overwhelmed, so excited, still trying to absorb as many words as I possibly can in this place of overwhelming prose and wonder and knowledge and life. How lucky am I?

Am I allowed to nap? How many days during the week am I allowed to nap?